Shadow fell upon me, a silent presence moving with the one who cast it. I halted my reach for the bishop, surprised someone stood behind me. I turned and beheld the someone I hadn't met.

"Atanarjuat, I presume?"

"Yes, who are you?" I asked. My hairs raised up and I sensed they were human, but smelled of wolf. I noted the smock and the soft shoes, guessing I might be meeting the battalion psychiatrist.

"Doctor Imbrium. Your meeting with me was delayed by my absence." Doctor Imbrium briefed me. "And now I'd like it if you come with me."

I was losing chess to Abbot, so I tipped my king so he wouldn't wait for me to come back. "See you later."

I went with Doctor Imbrium to a hub of administration offices meant for running the massive underground facility. None of them were in use, except for the one chosen by Doctor Imbrium for a private office. "This is my office." Doctor Imbrium told me.

"So I see." I looked around and saw the collection of tapestries, books, very old books, a draped belt of wolf hide and also the large skull of a werewolf. "Studying?"

"Always. There is so much to learn, and the more I learn, the more I find out is out there that I don't know. It is how I am." Doctor Imbrium sat down and smiled.

I sat too and waited but Doctor Imbrium said nothing else. So, I asked:

"What can I do for you, Doctor?"

"Tell me about yourself. That is what I have brought you here for. I'd like to learn about you." Doctor Imbrium opened the floor for me. "Convince me you don't need multiple sessions with me by getting it right on the first try."

"Aggressive." I noted.

"You?"

"No, your method of getting to know me."

"Does that provoke you? Intimidate you? Start there."

"It intimidates me because I feel uncomfortable, and I don't want to have to come back. I think I had better just tell you all about myself and not hold back."

"Very well. Don't hold back."

"When I got here, I was very sad and broken. I had nightmares in which I saw through the eyes of the killer from my village and watched the people who were killed in their final moments. It seemed like I had killed them all. Their blood was on my hands."

"You mean, as a lycan?" Doctor Imbrium asked me to clarify.

"Yes. I guess I don't like thinking about it. I was able to overcome this when I was renamed, and the pack sang for me. Something in me changed. I started to recover. I was able to mourn my losses with dignity and time and I have begun to heal. I feel alright while I am with the pack, and at night I can sleep. I miss my old life, but I have resolved to try to find meaning in all this, by doing my duty. I'm ready stand against the worst things, if that is what I am called to do."

"Is that all?" Doctor Imbrium waited, something loaded in the question.

"Yes." I said, hearing the hesitation in my own voice.

"There isn't any sort of relationship that has affected your well-being?" Doctor Imbrium slowly stood and went over to a black mirror and took up a small remote for it.

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"No, nothing like that. I am friends with all the pack members. I play chess with Abbot, eat with everyone, train with the lieutenant colonel, study the drills and play basketball."

Doctor Imbrium seemed to be ignoring me and brought up an image of me and Bruna standing and holding hands. There was a cascade of images, all of them were surveillance files showing us together, all of them were paused on us smiling or laughing or close to each other.

"And Major Hazel, you don't have a relationship with her?" Doctor Imbrium asked, slowly turning to face me.

"Uh, we do spend a lot of time together." I admitted.

"You spend forty-eight percent of all your time with her. You're rarely apart, except for bedtime." Doctor Imbrium brought up an image of me in my quarters asleep on my cot.

"We are very close friends." I felt nervous for some reason. I had avoided mentioning her without thinking, and apparently, Doctor Imbrium had expected me to.

"Shouldn't be a problem if the two of you were given orders to cease fraternization. You both have plenty of other friends and activities and lots of training you could put your time towards." Doctor Imbrium reached to a shelf and brought down some kind of brown envelope. I guessed those were the orders they had mentioned.

Involuntarily I started growling. I felt threatened, like Doctor Imbrium had found a way to hurt Bruna and was going to implement me in it, using me against her. The thought of leaping onto them and tearing out their throat invaded my thoughts and I couldn't think. I became angry.

"I've made you angry. Oh dear." Doctor Imbrium stood there, perfectly calm. "I'm not worried. You'll control yourself."

"Why are you doing this?" I asked with too much resentment in my voice.

"I haven't done anything. Is something wrong?" Doctor Imbrium tilted their glasses back and held the envelope under one arm.

"I just forgot to mention her. Why would you have all that? I don't understand." I took deep breaths, telling myself to stop talking, realizing I was giving away far more information than I could get in exchange.

"This is for your own good. Do you want to be with her, or is this just some kind of wolf thing?" Doctor Imbrium casually sat across from me and smiled, as though nothing was wrong.

"Wolf thing?" I asked, my head tilted. I wasn't sure how to take that. I didn't like being a lycan, I didn't identify myself as one. I suddenly realized the most basic difference between Bruna and myself. Doctor Imbrium was watching me, reading me, seeming to be interpreting my reactions accurately and after I had realized that some part of me wanted those orders, they said:

"These orders give me the authority to determine how long and how far you two will be separated. But it isn't up to me, because this is about you, and what is best for you." Doctor Imbrium handed me the envelope. "I'd like you to fill in the part about the duration and degree of the restraint."

I numbly opened the envelope and read the orders, signed by our mutual commanding officer as a matter of conduct. I couldn't believe the lieutenant colonel had deferred to Doctor Imbrium. It somehow made it seem like I should go along with it.

"I don't want this." I said with the amount of control I felt I had over the situation. "No duration, no degree."

"I see." Doctor Imbrium accepted the envelope as I handed it back with the signed orders inside.

"Have you learned what you want about me?"

"I have. Thank you for cooperating with me, Atanarjuat. Do you wish to know what my analysis of you will sound like?" Doctor Imbrium wasn't really done with me.

"Yes, actually, I would."

"Very well. I will recommend that you undergo further evaluation at a later date. I will note that you concealed your most intimate relationship and when confronted with a compromising circumstance you became angry. It was only when the threat was removed that you calmed down. Do you resent me for collecting evidence to use to confront you and preparing these orders, getting help from your chief to do so?"

"I do resent it." I admitted, realizing I had better be better than honest.

"And you probably don't trust that I am just doing my job, and that all of this was to evaluate you for your best interest. It is your mental well being I am charged with. I have to know what makes you tick. I am sorry I took you apart, but I hope that after putting you back together, you can let it go." Doctor Imbrium concluded.

"I can let it go. I'm sorry." I stood up. "I'd like to go now."

"Go ahead."

I stormed out, heading for my quarters. I had never felt so angry in my life. I'd never thought about killing someone out of anger before. I'd gotten in a few fights in school, but we were always friends again the next day. With Doctor Imbrium, I had felt the urge, my thoughts like an unstoppable force, urging me towards violence.

In my cell I closed the door and covered myself under blankets, shaking and wondering who I was. I did not recognize myself. I had spent so much time with a wolf, I had started to become one. No, that wasn't fair, Bruna hadn't made me this way. I trembled, afraid of what I was becoming.

Doctor Imbrium had learned a few superficial things about how I spent my time, but I had learned that the beast was within me, waiting for an excuse, an opening. And I feared it.